iDon't
by ipwnyourmother
Summary: ‘No’ is a powerful word. You should try it some time.


**A/N: My daily writing exercises keep turning into fic. It's ridiculous. Seriously, it is. Anyways, I don't own iCarly. **

'No' is a powerful word. It's one of the first words we learn as children and we love it. We experiment wildly with it, testing our parent's boundaries. No, mom, I won't go to bed. No, dad, I won't brush my teeth. No, grandpa, I won't give your dentures back. No, no, no, no, no. We say it so often when we're young! It comes so easily to us. But as we get older, it gets harder. We struggle to say it and slowly 'no' becomes a rather reluctant 'sure.' Sure, I'll go to prom with you. Sure, I'll wash your car. Sure, I'll clean the toilet. We stop saying no because we think it's too harsh – too rude, too inconsiderate, to unkind. We don't want to say 'No, I don't like your new hair cut' because we're afraid to hurt the other person's feelings. So instead we lie and we're so unconvincing with our overly excited, 'yes, it's great!'s. And if people looked closely, they would know we were lying, because they do it, too. But they don't look closely, because they don't want to know that we don't want to go out with them and we do think their jeans make them look fat and for god's sake, when we say they shouldn't have bought us that sweater, we really mean it.

Ours is a society built on courtesy for other people – and sometimes, that means never saying no. But recently I thought – screw courtesy for other people. How 'bout a little courtesy for myself? Recently I learned to say no. And it felt damn good.

Even if I did learn to do it at the most inopportune time possible.

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I think your wedding day is meant to be the best day of your life, isn't it? All smiles and joy and giddy predictions of the future. I mean, I always thought it was something along those lines. That's what they always say. Not that I know who 'they' are, I just mean… In the movies, when a man is waiting at the altar, watching his future wife walk down that aisle, he's always smiling and she's smiling back at him and everyone in the church is crying because they're so happy.

But when I was standing there, watching the woman I was going to be my wife walk up that aisle… Well, I wasn't smiling. And I wasn't predicting our future – three kids and a house in the suburbs? I don't think so. Not us. In fact, standing there, watching her walk towards me… I couldn't even picture us five minutes in the future, let alone five years. I could see myself in the future. I could definitely see that. And I could see myself with children, but I couldn't see her.

And then I realized that the mysterious 'wife' of my future – the one who bore my children, who slept in the same bed as me, who I kissed goodbye every morning in the fantasy of my future… It wasn't her. It wasn't the pretty blonde who was walking up the aisle to me. The fantasy wife of my future didn't have a face, but… it definitely wasn't Samantha Puckett.

And the second I realized that, I realized that Sam wasn't smiling as she walked towards me either. And I wondered… how did we get here?

That was when I realized it. We got there from a lifetime of saying 'yes' instead of 'no.' Yes, I want to go on a date with you, yes, I love you, too, yes, I think you're beautiful, yes, I'll _marry you_, when what we really meant was, no, no, no, no, no.

But by then it was too late, wasn't it? By then it was already over, she was standing beside me, and I was taking her hand and the priest was saying something and Spencer and Carly were standing on either side of us as best man and maid of honor and – we couldn't take this back.

Then the priest looked at me, all solemnity and seriousness and he said, "Fredward Benson, do you take Samantha Puckett to be your lawfully wedded life?"

I couldn't even stop myself. I stared at him for a moment and I said, "I don't."

A collective gasp went through the church and Carly said, "Freddie!" at the same moment that Sam said, "Thank god!"

And she looked at me and smiled, and I laughed and kissed her cheek and said, "What were we thinking?"

And Carly looked at the both of us and said, "So, what, you're just… not going to get married?"

We both said 'no' at the same time.

'No' is a powerful word. You should try it some time.


End file.
